Hungary postpones NATO ratification of Finland, Sweden till next year

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Hungary's parliament plans to ratify NATO membership for Finland and Sweden in early 2023, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Thursday.

Earlier in November, the head of Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s office, Gergely Gulyas, said that "Finland and Sweden are our allies, and they can count on us."

He informed them that the Hungarian parliament would vote on the accession of the two countries to NATO later this year. But first, it had to deal with the adoption of solutions required by the European Commission to unblock EU funds.

BREAKING:

“Hungary’s government supports the NATO membership of Sweden and Finland and has submitted the ratification documents to the parliament.”

The news was delivered today by Orban’s Chief of Staff, Gergely Gulyás, who said that parliament is likely to pass it by December. pic.twitter.com/X3Q5SFrDyX

— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) October 22, 2022

Following a meeting of the Visegrad Group in Slovakia earlier today, Orban said his government had already decided that Hungary would support Finland's and Sweden's NATO accession.

He further said that Parliament would set this item on its agenda at its first session next year.

"Hungary will surely give its backing to their accession after the government had done, also parliament will do so," Orban said. 

Out of all the NATO members, Hungary and Turkey are the only countries that still did not clear Sweden and Finland's accession. 

On July 5, the permanent representatives of NATO member states signed accession protocols for the two Scandanavian countries at the alliance's headquarters in Brussels.

All members of the bloc have to ratify the protocols according to their national legislation.

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